


You Know...Whatever

by HelenRichardson



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: But it's okay, F/F, Fluff, One Shot, Young Love, aka Catra and Adora are in love but they don't know it yet, bc they love each other and that's all that matters, in which Shadow Weaver is a little bitch and also homophobic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:00:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28102077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HelenRichardson/pseuds/HelenRichardson
Summary: “We used to have those. Sleepovers. Me and Adora, when we were cadets in the Horde. We’d play tricks on Kyle, stay up all night whispering about...you know...whatever.”
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 90





	You Know...Whatever

“Hey.”

Catra opened her eyes. The dim light from the hallway illuminated Adora’s upside-down face, hanging over the side of her bed. Catra rubbed her eyes blearily as Adora grinned. 

“What’s up?”

“Adora…” Catra whispered. “It’s late.”

“I can’t sleep.” Adora’s face disappeared and was replaced by a pair of feet as she climbed down from her bunk. “And I know you can’t either.”

“How do you know that?”

“You breathe different when you’re awake.” Adora smirked.

“You listen to me breathe? Gross!” Catra tossed a pillow at her, but after a moment she moved over to make room for Adora on her bed. Adora happily slid into place, pushing her shoulder up against Catra’s and grinning. 

“I can’t help it,” she said. “You breathe so loudly I bet Lonnie could hear it two beds over.”

“I do  _ not _ .”

“Do too.”

“Shut up.”

Adora giggled quietly, and Catra couldn’t help but smile. “You nervous about tomorrow?” she asked. 

“Ugh, I don’t wanna think about it.” Adora gripped the end of her ponytail absentmindedly and gave it a tug. 

“It’s just an evaluation. I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

“But what if I don’t do fine? What if I mess up in front of Shadow Weaver?”

“She’ll go easy on you. She always does.”

“I don’t know.” Adora frowned into the darkness. “She says all this stuff about me being her prodigy or whatever, but that just means that I’m not allowed to fail.”

“Oh, you won’t fail,” Catra said. “You’ll get second place, right behind me.”

“You wish.” Adora grinned and elbowed her. “I’m totally gonna beat you.”

“Sure.” Catra smiled. “What’s the test even gonna be like, anway?”

“You’d  _ know _ that if you were at Captain Moradin’s lesson today,” Adora said. “Why’d you even miss it, anyways?”

Catra shrugged. “I was doing stuff.”

“What sort of stuff?”

“I don’t know, just stuff.”

“This is why you’re in second place, you know,” Adora said teasingly. “You leave class to go to ‘stuff.’”

“Hey!” Catra frowned and shoved her away. “Don’t say that.”

Adora’s face fell. “Sorry.” Her voice softened in a way that always made Catra cringe. “I didn’t know it bothered you so much.”

“It doesn’t, just...just shut up.” Catra turned away and crossed her arms.

“Catra,” Adora said. “Don’t be mad, I didn’t mean it.”

Catra squeezed her eyes shut and ignored her.

There was a moment of silence. Then, Catra felt warmth at her back as Adora leaned against her, facing the opposite wall. “It’s gonna be a princess encounter, by the way,” Adora said quietly. “It’s one-on-one combat against a member of the rebellion.”

“One-on-one?” Catra’s shoulders slumped. “But then...we can’t do it together.”

“It’s just one fight.”

“Yeah, but…” Catra bit her lip. “I fight better when you’re with me.”

Adora sighed. “Me too. But y’know, we won’t be able to fight every real battle together, anyways. When we both become force captains, we might be sent on missions to opposite sides of the globe.”

“Well, I’m glad we’re still junior cadets then.” Catra said.

“We have plenty of time. We don’t even get to become senior cadets until we’re seventeen. That’s like, years and years from now.”

Four years, to be exact. But the thought of it still didn’t sit well with her. Catra grumbled. “Well, once we take over the Horde we can be together as much as we want.”

“Exactly.” Catra let her arms drop and felt a jolt of...something when Adora took her hand. “We’ll rule the world together.”

Catra turned back and squeezed Adora’s hand. “Okay.” The two of them leaned against the cold cement wall, staring at the thick darkness that surrounded them. Even the light in the hallway had gone out. Adora leaned her head into the crook of Catra’s shoulder, and Catra felt her breath catch in her throat. Adora’s skin was warm against hers. She smelled like soap from the showers and something else, too. Something she couldn’t quite place. Catra took a deep breath and felt something buzz in the pit of her stomach. 

She wondered if Adora felt the buzzing, too. She didn’t ask. They sat together in the dark for a long time, not even noticing when their breathing synced together. 

Eventually, Adora shifted slightly and reached a hand under the pillow she’d been sitting on. “Do you have something under here?” she asked. “It’s lumpy.”

“Oh,” Catra said. “Yeah. I swiped some permanent markers from military strategy class.”

She couldn’t see Adora’s incredulous look, but she could tell it was there from her tone. “Why?”

“I dunno.” Catra shrugged. “I thought we could draw on the wall or something.”

“Oooh.” Adora sounded like she’d never even thought of the idea. “But what if Shadow Weaver finds out?”

“She won’t care. There’s graffiti and stuff all over the fright zone.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” There came the sound of Adora uncapping the marker. “I wish we still had the hall light on. I can’t see anything right now.”

“Uh, Adora. Don’t you have a flashlight on your bed?”

“Oh yeah!”

“Dummy.” Catra smirked and stood up. “I’ll get it.” She climbed out from under the bunk and hopped up onto Adora’s bed. The flashlight was tucked away in the space between her mattress and the wall, just like it had always been. Catra grabbed it and turned around, grinning. She was almost at the edge of the bed when she heard something from the hallway. Her ears pricked up. Now that she noticed it, there was no mistaking that quiet rustle.

“Shadow Weaver!” Catra dove under the covers and tried to look like she was asleep. No sooner had she shut her eyes than the rusty metal doors to the room slid open, creaking and grinding as they did so. Catra did her best to look like she was sleeping, only hoping Adora had heard her warning and was doing the same.

The rustling sound grew closer, stopping right next to her head. Catra inhaled slowly, trying with all her might to mimic a sleeping person’s breaths. For a moment she thought she had gotten away with it. But then a cold hand gripped her shoulder and shook her roughly, forcing her to open her eyes.

“Catra!” The sound of her voice alone made Catra want to shiver. “ Why are you in Adora’s bed?”

“We...we switched.” Catra sat up and gripped her elbows uncertainly. “We just switched beds for the night..”

“Hmmm.” There was no mistaking the malice in Shadow Weaver’s voice. Catra shivered. “Am I to understand, then, that you disobeyed curfew?”

“Only to switch beds!” Catra protested. “It was nothing. We weren’t talking or anything, I-”

The terrible coldness of one of her shadows began to trace itself up Catra’s face. She stopped talking and shivered violently. The entire left side of her face grew numb, like something was sucking all of the feeling away from it.

“You’re too old for this, Catra.” Shadow Weaver’s voice was deadly quiet. “Adora needs her sleep if she is to become a force captain one day. She needs to learn order and discipline. And  _ you _ -” Catra flinched away, “are preventing that from happening.”

“I-I’m sorry.” Catra dug her nails into her palms, but the sniffle came out anyway. “It won’t happen again.”

“Good.” Shadow Weaver’s voice took on an overly-sweet mocking tone. “I’m so glad you’ve learned your lesson. To prove it, you’ll spend tomorrow morning on kitchen duty.”

“But that’s when the evaluation is-” Catra jumped, feeling the shadow sink deeper into her skin.

“It is, isn’t it. Well, I guess you’ll just have to work quickly to get there on time. You might miss the introduction, but I’m sure it’ll be fine. You’re one of the best fighters in your rank, are you not?”

It was an accusation more than anything else. Catra tried her best to stop shivering. “Yes, Shadow Weaver.”

“Good.” The shadow pulled itself away from her face and Catra let out a sigh of relief. Shadow Weaver turned around and swept out of the room, the rusty metal door sliding shut behind her.

A minute passed where Catra could only hear the rattle of her own breaths. She began to hear Adora shifting below her, but she did not want to move. Not yet.

“Catra?”

Adora’s whisper was uncertain. Concerned. Catra hated it when she sounded like that.

“What?”

“Are you okay?”

Catra didn’t answer.

“We can do the drawing tomorrow instead, if you want.”

Silence.

“I’m sorry Catra, it’s not fair that she treats you like that. I should have stuck up for you. I just got scared.”

Catra shifted. “It’s okay.” She crawled over to the side of the bed and slid off, landing quietly on her feet. She couldn’t see Adora in the dark, but she didn’t jump when Adora took her hand and pulled her into a hug. 

“We can do the kitchen duty together,” she whispered. “She can’t punish me for wanting to do more chores.”

Catra let out a strained giggle and tried her best not to let the tears escape her eyelids. But if Adora’s shoulder grew a little damp anyways, she didn’t say anything about it.

After a few minutes, Adora released her from the hug and grabbed her shoulders. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s do some graffiti.” Catra giggled again at the awkward way she worded it.

Catra turned on the flashlight and aimed it at a spot of wall by the pillow. It would be almost completely hidden from view for anyone passing by, but she and Adora would know it was there. Adora took the cap off of one of the markers, the pink one, and began to draw herself. Catra watched her as she worked. Adora’s tongue was poking out of the corner of her mouth as she concentrated, and as she watched Catra felt her chest grow so full of... _ something _ that she could barely contain it. But she managed to keep the light steady. The resulting drawing was clumsy and unskilled, but it did end up looking surprisingly like Adora. When she finished Adora capped the marker and turned to her with a grin. “What do you think?”

“Not bad.” 

“Your turn.” Adora tossed her the other marker and crawled over to where Catra sat, taking the light from her hands. Catra scooted forwards and uncapped the marker, hesitating for only a moment before starting to draw. She put herself right next to Adora, drawing slowly so she didn’t mess up. In the end it didn’t look much better than Adora’s drawing, but it was good enough for her. She capped the marker and stuck it under the pillow, turning back to smile at Adora. 

“So?”

Adora dropped the light and crawled up next to her. “I like it.” She leaned against Catra, and after a moment where she held herself rigid, Catra let herself relax into her.

“Y’know,” Adora said, almost too quietly to be heard. “I’m...really glad that you’re here. I’m glad that you’re my friend.”

“I...me too.” Catra’s voice was just as quiet. She felt Adora smile. The two of them stared at their drawing in the dim light from the discarded flashlight. In the almost total darkness, everything melted away except for Adora beside her and the drawing a few feet away. She stared at it so long the lines stopped making sense, and realized she was falling asleep on Adora.

She shook herself awake. “Sorry,” she said thickly.

Adora looked down at her and smiled before breaking into a yawn. “S’ok.”

Catra climbed under her covers and lay down, looking up at Adora through heavy eyelids. She realized distantly that the buzzing was back. 

Adora climbed under the covers next to her and after a moment, shut off the light. Her hand found Catra’s, and she gripped it as they drifted off to sleep together.

Tomorrow, Shadow Weaver would find them sleeping in the same bed and yell at them for being up past curfew. She’d say that they were junior cadets now, too old for these sorts of antics, and she’d tell Adora to keep Catra under control or else. But tonight, none of that was real. Only she and Adora existed, and they were together and that meant things would be okay. No one would find them here in the warm darkness. It was just she and her, until time stopped moving forward and sleep took them both.

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
